


i'll see you in my nightmares

by brightblackholes



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King, IT 2017
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, Nightmares, Post-Chapter 1, Pre-IT Chapter Two (2019), Richie is in college, canon compliant amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-30
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2021-01-13 09:04:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21241598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brightblackholes/pseuds/brightblackholes
Summary: He never remembers his nightmares, but he knows they're terrifying, and they happen almost every night.Written for writer's month day 12: dreams





	i'll see you in my nightmares

**Author's Note:**

> At some point, the clown movie snuck up on me and I fell in love with all of those kids :/
> 
> Written for writer's month day 12: dreams (even though I'm like. two months behind)
> 
> There is a kiss. It is not with who Richie thinks it was with, because nightmare.

Richie gets along  _ great _ with his roommate, at least a lot better than he did with his freshman year match. Sure, the guy gets annoyed at Richie’s messiness sometimes and he wakes up early every morning to go on runs, but overall Jack’s pretty good. He laughed at Richie’s introductory joke on move-in day, and the way their schedules fall means that there’s a good amount of alone time without Richie feeling like he’s living with a ghost. It’s only been two weeks, but it’s working out so far and Richie is feeling optimistic for the rest of the year.

Jack also isn’t really one to beat around the bush when something’s bothering him, but Richie washed his dishes so he’s not sure why his roommate is currently standing with his hands on his hips instead of going to the library to study, since he’s one of  _ those _ college kids.

“Richie, we need to talk,” he says.

“Okay?” Richie asks, sitting up. Jack looks really serious, and a bit uncomfortable. Richie would love to still be his roommate after this conversation.

“It’s about your nightmares.”

“Oh,” Richie says. That had been an issue with his roommate last year, too, although it was probably low on the priority list compared to some of the other arguments they’d gotten into.

“What about them?” he asks.

“Just--look, I’m not trying to be rude or anything, okay? But do you have, like, coping mechanisms or anything? Am I supposed to be waking you up if you start yelling or leave you be? Are there like, certain conditions that make it worse? Because sometimes you’re just twitchy but sometimes you scream, and one of those is preferable if I’m trying to sleep too.” Jack winces. “Okay, I’m not like...trying to make your nightmares about me. I get that dreams are weird and we can’t control them but--I mean I’m just used to sleeping through the night more than I have been since I started sharing with you.”

Richie takes off his glasses and cleans them just to give him an excuse to avoid eye contact.

“I don’t know, man. I’ve had these for years. Can’t even remember them once I wake up, just know that sometimes I do and I’m scared. I guess you can wake me up if they’re bothering you? I don’t know. My parents could never hear any yelling, so I didn’t even know I made noise until last year when my roommate freaked out at me about it.”

Jack winces. He’s really a softie, and Richie appreciates his delicacy with the situation right now.

He can never remember his nightmares, but he knows they’re terrifying, and they happen almost every night. He’s woken up with tears on his cheeks, shoulders aching from the tension he holds in them at night, blood on his palms where his nails have dug in too tight, tight enough that he’s started keeping his nails short and dull to cut down on the crescent scars to go with the straight line on his hand. It always takes a few seconds to figure out where he is through the blind terror he feels when they’re bad enough to wake him up. Sometimes he can’t go back to sleep afterwards, even if he doesn’t even know what horrible things his mind conjures in dreams.

“Okay. I guess we’ll just...play it by ear, then,” Jack says. Richie nods.

“Sure thing, Jack-in-the-Box. Feel free to Sleeping Beauty me whenever you want.”

Jack snorts and rolls his eyes in a move that feels too familiar for having known him for two weeks. Maybe he reminds Richie of someone else…

Sometimes, Richie’s really frustrated at how fuzzy his memory of childhood is.

-/-

_ It’s dark, but it’s always dark. Even in broad daylight, no one in Derry ever seems to open their curtains to let the sunlight in, and the creature living in the house on Neibolt Street definitely doesn’t care about sunlight. The shadows probably help It scare anyone who wanders in. _

_ But Richie isn’t wandering. He’s been here before, hasn’t he? But he wasn’t alone. _

_ Where are the others? _

_ “Richie?” a voice calls. _

_ “Eddie?” he replies. He recognizes that voice. He loves the way his name sounds when Eddie is the one saying it. _

_ “Richie, where are you?” _

_ “I’m right here,” he says, stepping further into the house. Eddie’s voice is coming down a long hallway, and Richie knows he has to reach him soon. He’s not sure what’s going to happen if he doesn’t, because Eddie doesn’t even sound scared, but Richie puts one foot in front of the other anyway. _

_ “Richie, hurry up! I have something for you!” _

_ Richie quickens his pace, and suddenly there Eddie is. He looks exactly like he did the morning his mom took him away from Derry in high school, except his right arm has a cast, black LOSER scrawled across it with a red V covering the S. He’s got the same neat dark hair and light polo shirt, though, and the same ridiculously short shorts that show off his legs. Richie spent a lot of time specifically not looking at those legs. _

_ Richie sees him and thinks he’s going to melt. _

_ “Eds,” he says, breathless. _

_ “Come here,” Eddie says, then they’re kissing. Eddie walks him backwards towards their old childhood hammock, and just as he’s about to sink down into it he notices that it’s already occupied. _

_ Eddie’s face stares back up at him, corpse frozen in terror and maggots already crawling out of his eyes. _

_ Richie screams. _

_ The Eddie he had been kissing looks down impassively, then starts to smile, large and unnatural. _

_ “Oopsies,” he says, voice morphing higher and sending shivers down Richie’s spine. “Shame that Eds couldn’t join the party today!” His twitches unnaturally, and It’s eyes shift from Eddie’s brown ones to the yellow ones that have haunted Richie’s dreams for years. _

_ “He wouldn’t have liked that very much, anyway,” It says, face paling, red lines forming to connect the lips to It’s eyes. “Eds isn’t a dirty boy, Richie. Not like you. Right, Eds?” _

_ The Eddie corpse sits up and looks right at him, shaking with fear and disgust, but when he opens his mouth only blood comes out. Richie tries to rear back, or maybe to go to him, but his arm is tangled in the hammock, then so are his legs, then he’s falling and Eddie is still looking at him with blood coming out of his mouth and Pennywise is laughing and-- _

“Richie!”

He bolts upright, nearly head-butting Jack in the process. His chest is heaving, but he can’t see anything and he doesn’t have an inhaler and he doesn’t even have asthma or  _ know _ anyone with asthma and--

“Richie, calm down man. It was just a dream, okay? Just one of your nightmares.”

Jack. Right. He’s in his dorm room not… not wherever that dream took place. He doesn't even know if it was inside or outside at this point. Any remnants of the dream have disappeared. He shoves on his glasses and flicks on a lamp anyway, just to solidify that.

Above him, Jack looks tired.

“Sorry,” Richie says. Jack shrugs, then wipes a hand down his face and sighs.

“It’s fine, man. I know you can’t help it.”

Richie shrugs.

“So, who’s Eddie?”

“What?” he asks, squinting back up at Jack.

“Eddie? You were yelling about him or something.”

Richie wracks his memory for any fleeting instance where he might have met someone named Eddie, but nothing is coming to mind. Maybe he just saw the name on a waiter’s name tag, or maybe there was an Eddie in one of his classes last year. Nothing to merit a nightmare about one of them, though.

“I don’t know,” he says. “Eddie Murphy, maybe? He’s the only Eddie that really matters.”

Jack snorts and turns back towards his own bed.

“Fine, then. Keep your secrets, Richie. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Night,” he replies, but instead of flicking the lamp back off he grabs his cigarettes and slips on some shoes. The night air is cool against his still-flushed skin, and the smoke helps calm his jittery nerves, still trying to come down from the adrenaline rush nightmares always give him.

What was the name Jack said he was yelling? Eddie? Freddie?

Richie once read that dreams always have people you know in them, because your brain can’t create new faces subconsciously. He wonders if that means there’s an actual guy out there he was dreaming about. Richie wonders if he’s okay.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos always appreciated!


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